In 2009 Boom Publishers published the long-waited-for Dutch translation of Peter Sloterdijk’s Sphären lll. Schäume – Plurale Sphärologie. I was anxious to read it. Spheres lll, as I would call the book in English is the third book of the ‘Foam trilogy,’ Sloterdijk’s opus magnum and treat to our understanding of humanity, communities and ‘being there.’ For me, Sloterdijk’s writings have become an object to think with regarding media, technology and culture. The trilogy has a straightforward set up: book l, microspheres named Blasen (bubbles), book ll, macrospheres named Globen and book lll Plural Spherology named Schaum (Foam). That is the conceptual set up of the trilogy in which we must understand that the three levels of spheres cannot do without each other. Spheres or better Spherology is about people and space. It is, as Peter Sloterdijk (whom I shall refer to in this text as PS) calls it a ‘Chronolatry in Space,’ a border-transcendent movement, say traffic, in which capital(value creation such as economic, social, democratic and cultural values) generates. PS wrote, “If you are in the world, you are always in a sphere.” And this is precisely the issue when trying to understand what and how new media is affecting our lives and consequently, the regulation, rule, of it. A rule does not necessarily mean formal law-prescription and enforcement. It may also refer to functional operating systems in which people can participate and feel part of the group, protocol perhaps. Regulation in that sense can be regarded as a projection of security – belonging – and PS’s words lead us, as the projection of security, to the feeling of Immunity, as an individual but also as a group and even further, grander communities (cities, countries, the world). It is, as he calls it, a creational attempt of the System, the sphere that holds groups together. Immunity systems (foam bubbles) may be regarded as a projection of security. Way back in time, the tribe was the sphere of immunity and togetherness was the spiritual unity to guard us. Once Christian theology appeared, the human factor disappeared in favor of the appearance of God who now symbolized immunity through unity. Along with fascism and communism, religion is an attempt to create macro systems. In the idiom of Spherology PS calls them Globen (globes). In line with this logic, PS now coins capitalism as the most important macro sphere or Globe. Apart from eruditely feeding the reader with a sheer endless list of coherent examples of his spherological realism, PS uses the metaphor of foam to illustrate the pluralism and varieties of common behavior when peoples live close to each other. The closer we live together, the more and the smaller the bubbles become; a multi-room society, from Globen; foam bubbles on a macro scale like countries or cities to the level of intimate, tiny bubbles as a representation of our smallest immunity, our room. In all cases, there are communities (clubs, schools, friends) that all form these bubbles and provide resilience thus offering possibilities of resistance to totalization of society. According to PS, this is positive human behavior. But, imperative signals from outside our modern, intimate spheres influence us. They do so through media. Ideas, thoughts, wishes can all be misused in microspheres and may, eventually trickle down to the microspheres of our existence. This trickle is, for instance, precisely what happens in advertising. On the other hand, there are dynamics in the foam and according to PS. This is because we are non-conformists; we do not want to be as the whole, the group, community. We want to be unique. In the strictest fashion of philosophy, Sloterdijk states that on the other hand again, we do imitate each other at the same time. An unusual behavior with the core that we conform to what we not to adapt to, we show resistance to the community we (want to) belong to yet we are part of that community. PS calls this the romanticizing of the resistance. It is Keynes, the critique of cynical reasoning and most likely the distinctive characteristic of a system period. It is resistance to outside elements that want to inhibit our bubbles. That is why we must be fit in our immune system; a fit system will respond openly and appropriately, an immune system that is not fit will react in a xenophobic sense. Entirely in line with his metaphor, PS states that too much hygiene and security in a community – please allow yourself a good look at our contemporary state of the union – causes group-autism only to dissolve itself when getting in contact with fearful foes. The system (community) will turn against itself for as people cannot distinguish real threats from false, they cannot recognize their misfits. The mogul of the community will fight itself. Initially, religious immune systems offered comfort to such an extent that even death was not a real threat (Heaven as the ultimate and ever-lasting Utopia). But technology became religion’s opponent and more and more people de-slaved themselves from poverty. Perhaps PS uses this in advocacy of social constructivism; Technological Imaginary as an immune system against totalization of communities? In any case, because of technology the wanting, being able and execution are now closer related than ever. It makes us as mighty as God. To conclude, let me quote Sloterdijk from the Dutch translation on page 598 (translation by me) as he attempts to relativize his self-alleged pomposity of thought and theory: “Let me not arouse false expectations. I would not dare assert that I have understood what the so-called spheres eventually mean. I doubt if I will work with such expressions in the future. It has not become fully clear to me what dyads or multipolar surrealistic spaces are, let alone be able to reproduce how peoples under their canopies, how city cultures behind their immunofixation walls and how the liberal populations in their pampering greenhouses live. Anyway, historians are known for not being feeble with abstract ideas. In any case, I am convinced that these vague and grandiloquent theories, with the thoroughness in which I cannot believe to the full, one way or the other fall back on the [mentioned] phase construction I, after long but never disputed trial, hold for grounded”. Personally, I do believe that Sloterdijk’s philosophy of Plural Spherology bears elucidation and metaphor in understanding communities in their habitat and the role of technology and media. But then, I am not a historian. Personally, I do believe that Sloterdijk’s philosophy of Plural Spherology bears elucidation and metaphor in understanding communities in their habitat and the role of technology and media. But then, I am not a historian.

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Kees Winkel

I am Kees Winkel (20-10-1958). I live in Amsterdam and work in Utrecht, Netherlands. I graduated as a primary school teacher in 1979 but never got to the job. Later I studied commercial Communication (1984) and started my marketing communication career in the early eighties as a copywriter. Soon I took interest in the psychological aspects of communication and specialized as brand strategist with advertising agencies. In 2000, I moved to Finland where I worked as Sr. brand strategist with Satama Interactive, mainly consulting companies on digital and mobile marketing, branding and customer care. In 2005, I returned to the Netherlands and have ever since lectured and done research on Crossmedia at the University of Applied Sciences, Institute of Communication, The Netherlands. In 2007, I published 'Vision, Mission, Compassion', a book on communicative strategy. Currently (end 2017) I’m writing my master thesis new media and digital culture at the University Utrecht.
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